ORIGINAL: Obee
I would post this in another area but i feel a bit of a brotherhood with this group. the WH SU-26 is my first giant gas plane and I love it. However yesterday I let it bite me. I usually start it on a ground based hold down which has been very solid and holds it at the tail. During this incident I "Changed horses mid stream" and started it on a folding table with pylons that block the LE of the wings close to the fuse. I used this table during engine testing and found it to work well until applying a lot of throttle, then the table would move a little. Yesterday I started it on the table at a high idle and the plane-table combination lurched forward just enough to inspire my brain to react in a reflexive response and get my right hand ring finger nearly cut off near the root bed. My chicken stick took the majority of the impact and shredded the prop. My finger tip is fractured,nail removed, tendons and nerves are intact and all has been stitched together, even the nail. Now I have little time to think about safety, time off work and how to prevent this kind of thing from happening to me or others again. So that's why I have posted this here. Please be careful with these big beautiful and powerful planes. Tom I'll order a hop up kit and a prop soon.
Obee.
Sorry to hear the accident. It is too bad.
I would like to add that as a safety procedure always check to make sure the throttle is no more open than 1/8 of the travel. This has to be confirmed by looking through the cowl front opening to the carb body.
The other step that is equally important is to shut down the engine after landing and never point the airplane while engine running toward the pits area. A bump up of the throttle for whatever reason will make the plane an instant killing machine.